Chapter 8 Ben #2
I settle onto my couch and flip to the game. Might as well make the best of this. “You guys can stay. I’ve got blankets, the couch pulls out, and apparently enough food to survive the apocalypse.”
“Was that in question?” Milo drops into the armchair like he owns it. “I’m not driving in that. Besides, this is nice. Guy time. We never just hang out anymore.”
“We hang out,” Elijah says.
“At town events. While working. That doesn’t count.”
“Grabbed a beer last month.”
“For twenty minutes before you disappeared to finish some project.”
Elijah considers this. “Fair.”
He’s right though. Between my shop, Milo’s bar, and whatever projects Elijah’s always working on, we don’t get together as often as we used to. It’s been months since it was just the three of us with nowhere to be.
Elijah takes the other end of the couch, beer resting on his knee. The cabin feels warmer with them here, less empty. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about how quiet this place is when I’m alone, but I notice it now.
The contrast.
“So.” Milo’s voice is casual. Too casual. “You going to tell us why you’re avoiding Tessa Lang like she’s got the plague?”
And there it is.
“I’m not avoiding her.”
“You ran out the back of Millie’s.”
“Why does everyone know about that?”
“It’s Honeyridge Falls, Ben. Everyone knows everything.” Milo takes a sip of his beer, eyes on the game but clearly not watching it. “What’s your deal with her anyway? She’s just trying to put together a charity event.”
“I know what she’s trying to do.”
“Then why won’t you help?”
I don’t have a good answer for that. Not one I can say out loud, anyway.
Elijah’s quiet, but I can feel him listening. The guy doesn’t miss much, even when he’s pretending not to pay attention.
“I just don’t want to be in a bachelor auction, okay? Is that so hard to understand?”
“Yes,” Milo says flatly. “Because you love attention. You literally thrive on it. Remember the hot dog contest?”
“Why does everyone keep bringing up the hot dog contest?”
“Because you won and then took a victory lap around the town square.”
“That was celebratory! It was for charity!”
“And this is also for charity.” Milo’s not letting this go. “The community center roof. You know, where the seniors do their knitting circle? Annie Winslow had to put out buckets last week.”
“I heard about the buckets.”
“Then you know it’s important. And Tessa’s killing herself trying to make this event work.”
Elijah clears his throat. We both turn to look at him.
“She’s been working really hard,” he says quietly. “Tessa. On this event. It would mean a lot to her if you said yes.”
Something about the way he says it makes me look at him more closely. There’s a softness in his voice that wasn’t there a minute ago. A warmth.
Huh.
“You spent time with her recently?” I try to keep my voice neutral.
Elijah’s jaw tightens. Just slightly, but I notice. “Delivered some pieces for the auction yesterday. We got lunch.”
“You got lunch.” I exchange a glance with Milo, who looks equally intrigued. “Like a date?”
“Like lunch.” But there’s color on Elijah’s cheeks now, and he’s suddenly very interested in the label on his beer bottle. “She hadn’t eaten. I hadn’t eaten. Maeve had sandwiches.”
“That’s a lot of justification for ‘just lunch,’“ Milo says.
“Drop it.”
“I’m just saying—”
“I said drop it.” Elijah’s voice has an edge now. Interesting.
Well, well, well.
Milo’s been openly into Tessa since she moved to town three years ago. That’s not news to anyone. He flirts with her every time she comes into the bar, and she pretends to be annoyed and tries not to smile. It’s practically a town tradition at this point.
But Elijah?
Quiet, keeps-to-himself, barely-speaks-to-anyone Elijah?
I watch him not watching me, and something clicks into place. The way he always volunteers to make pieces for her events. How he knows her coffee order. The vases he carved for the Valentine’s auction that were definitely more elaborate than necessary.
Son of a bitch. Elijah Smith has feelings for Tessa Lang.
Which makes three of us.
Not that I’m going to think about that right now.
“She’s stressed,” Elijah continues, still studying his beer. “About the auction. She only has seven bachelors confirmed.”
“Eight would be better,” Milo adds, and they’re both looking at me now.
“I’m not doing it.”
“Why not?” Milo leans forward. “And don’t give me the prize pig bullshit. What’s the real reason?”
The real reason is sitting in my chest like a stone, and I’m not drunk enough to let it out.
The real reason is that the only person I want bidding on me is Tessa herself. And she can’t. She’s organizing the damn thing. Conflict of interest or whatever.
So what’s the point?
Standing up on that stage, letting random women bid on me, knowing she’s just watching from the sidelines with her clipboard, probably not even caring—
I can’t do it. I can’t stand there and pretend I don’t want her to fight for me the way I’ve been fighting not to want her for three years.
“I just don’t want to,” I say finally. “Drop it.”
Milo and Elijah exchange a look. The kind of look that says they’re not buying it but they’re going to let it go. For now.
“Fine.” Milo settles back in his chair. “But when she finally corners you and you can’t escape, don’t say we didn’t warn you.”
“She’s not going to corner me.”
“She absolutely is. That woman is relentless.” He grins. “It’s kind of hot, actually.”
“You think everything is hot.”
“Not everything. Just competent women who could probably kill me with a well-organized spreadsheet.”
“She does have good spreadsheets,” Elijah says.
Milo and I both stare at him.
“What? I’ve seen them. For the auction logistics.” He shrugs. “Color-coded. Very thorough.”
“Elijah.” Milo shakes his head slowly. “You’re complimenting her spreadsheets. You’ve got it bad.”
“I was just—” He stops. Takes a drink of his beer. “Shut up.”
I feel some of the tension drain out of the room.
This is nice, I realize. Just the three of us, stuck in a cabin, giving each other shit. Like old times.
The game plays on in the background. The snow keeps falling. We crack open more beers and argue about stats and whether the referees are biased and who makes the best burger in town (Millie’s, obviously, anyone who says otherwise is wrong).
“Remember when we helped move that couch into the community center for the Christmas fair?” Milo grins. “And you dropped your end?”
“I didn’t drop it.” I point my beer at him. “You let go.”
“I sneezed!”
“You sneezed for thirty seconds while I held a couch by myself.”
Elijah shakes his head. “I had to carry the table in alone because you two were arguing about whose fault it was.”
“And you did it without complaining.” Milo raises his beer to him. “That’s why you’re the favorite.”
“I don’t have favorites,” I say.
“You absolutely do. It’s Elijah. Everyone’s favorite is Elijah.”
“I’m not anyone’s favorite,” Elijah says. “I’m just quiet. People confuse that with agreeable.”
“Are you not agreeable?”
“I just agreed to spend my Saturday hauling furniture in a snowstorm.” He takes a sip of his beer. “Draw your own conclusions.”
Milo laughs. “See? Funny and humble. Favorite.”
Elijah’s ears go pink, but there’s a small smile on his face as he watches the snow pile up against the window.
That’s how it works in a town like Honeyridge.
You end up friends with people you might never have met anywhere else.
Milo’s a few years younger, runs in different circles—or he did, before he took over the bar.
Elijah keeps to himself mostly, out at his workshop.
But you volunteer for enough town events, help out at enough fundraisers, and pretty soon you’re drinking beers together watching the game.
Different as hell, but it works. Small towns are like that.
At some point, Milo takes over my kitchen and starts making chili. The smell fills the cabin—tomatoes and spices and meat browning—and my stomach growls loud enough that Elijah actually laughs.
“Shut up,” I tell him.
“Didn’t say anything.”
“You laughed. That’s saying something.”
Milo ladles out three bowls and we eat at my new table, in my new chairs, fire crackling in the fireplace, and the whole thing feels stupidly domestic. Like this is what the cabin was always meant for.
The cabin fills with warmth and noise and the smell of food.
Elijah tells us about a bookshelf commission he’s working on—custom built-ins for Ashpine Books, Levi’s expanding the back room—and his whole face changes when he talks about it.
Lighter. More open. The guy comes alive when he talks about his work.
Milo shares some gossip from the bar about the town council and their ongoing feud over parking regulations, which is somehow both boring and hilarious at the same time. Small town politics at its finest.
And I think again about how quiet this place usually is. How empty.
I only bought this place a month ago. Still slowly moving in, still getting used to having my own space after twenty-six years of living with my parents. I loved it there—love them, love the chaos, love that there was always someone to talk to. But it was time. A man needs his own place eventually.
And I do love it here. The quiet. The privacy. A place that’s just mine.
But nights like this make me wonder if I was running from something I actually needed.
Around eight, the wind picks up hard enough to rattle the windows. We all turn to look.
“Fuck,” Milo mutters.
The snow isn’t just falling anymore. It’s driving sideways, thick white sheets that make the trees across the road completely invisible. My truck is just a white lump in the driveway. The porch light barely cuts through three feet of air before it’s swallowed up.
“That’s... not great,” I say.
Elijah stands and walks to the window, peering out. “Can’t see the road.”
“Can’t see anything.” Milo joins him. “Hope nobody got caught out in this.”
The thought sends a cold twist through my gut. Ridge Road. Miller’s Pass. The mountain roads that wind between here and Pine Valley. Anyone stuck out there right now would be in serious trouble.
“Storm came in fast,” Elijah says quietly.
I don’t say anything. Just watch the white wall outside with unease.
We stand there for a minute, the three of us, watching the storm rage. The cabin feels smaller suddenly. Safer, but smaller. A little pocket of warmth in a whole lot of cold.
Elijah crosses to the fireplace and adds another log without being asked. The fire flares, casting flickering shadows across the walls.
“Hope nobody’s out in this,” Milo mutters.
Tessa drove to Pine Valley this morning for a vendor meeting. I know because I saw her car heading out of town when I was opening the shop. She would’ve taken Ridge Road—my road.
She should be back by now. Right?
The thought nags at me, but I push it down. Tessa Lang is the most competent person I know. She probably checked the weather, left early, and is sitting in her apartment right now color-coding something.
She’s fine.
Milo settles back into his chair. “Nothing we can do anyway. Might as well ride it out.”
He’s right. We’re stuck here. Everyone else is probably stuck wherever they are too. That’s just how Montana works in winter.
I try to focus on the game, but my eyes keep drifting to the window. To the white nothing outside.
Tessa’s fine. She has to be fine.
“You ever think about it?” Milo asks, scraping the last of his chili from the bowl. “Settling down. Finding a pack.”
“Is this your way of proposing?” I bat my eyelashes at him. “Because I’m flattered, but you’re not my type.”
“Your type is apparently angry women with clipboards who want to auction you off.”
“I don’t have a type.”
“You absolutely have a type. Elijah, back me up.”
Elijah considers this for a moment. “He likes stubborn ones. Who don’t take his shit.”
“I do not—” I stop, because they’re both grinning at me now. “I hate you both.”
“You love us.” Milo raises his beer. “To being snowed in with assholes.”
“To assholes,” Elijah agrees quietly, and clinks his bottle against ours.
We drink. The wind howls outside. The snow piles higher.
And for a while, I almost forget about Tessa Lang and her clipboard and my jacket that she still hasn’t returned and the way she looked at me that day in my shop when I wrapped my flannel around her shoulders and she stopped shivering and looked up at me with those eyes—
Almost.
My phone buzzes on the coffee table.
I glance at the screen.
Tessa Lang.
My heart does something stupid in my chest.
“You gonna answer that?” Milo’s watching me with an expression I can’t quite read.
The phone keeps buzzing. Her name glowing on the screen.
Why is she calling me? She never calls. She emails. She sends formal requests through the town’s volunteer coordinator. She ambushes me in public places with her clipboard.
She doesn’t call.
Unless something’s wrong.
I grab the phone and answer. “Tessa?”
Her voice comes through shaky and thin. “Ben. I need help. My car’s stuck and it won’t start and I can’t—” A gust of wind drowns out her next words.
“I’m on Ridge Road. Near the old Miller farm.
I can’t see anything and I don’t know what to do and you were—you’re a mechanic—I didn’t know who else to call. ”
Ridge Road. My road. The Miller farm is maybe a twenty-minute walk from here in good weather. In this storm—
“Stay in the car,” I say, already on my feet. “Keep the engine running if you can. We’re coming.”
“We?”
“Just stay put. We’ll find you.”
I hang up and look at Milo and Elijah, who are both already standing.
“Tessa’s stranded,” I say. “Miller farm. That’s maybe twenty minutes on foot.”
“We’re not driving in this,” Elijah says. “We’d end up stuck too.”
He’s right. Walking’s the only option.
“I’ve got flashlights and rope in the closet,” I say, already moving. “Extra coats.”
“I’ll grab blankets from my truck,” Milo adds. “She’s going to be freezing.”
In two minutes we’re geared up—flashlights, rope tied between us so we don’t lose each other, every warm layer I own. I grab my spare jacket for Tessa, since she still has my other one.
Elijah opens the door and the wind nearly knocks him back. Snow blasts into the cabin, thick and blinding.
Twenty minutes in good weather. In this?
Doesn’t matter. Tessa’s out there.
We push into the storm.